Wednesday, July 5, 2017

NEWS: DRAGONFORCE to kick off North American summer tour this Friday

OFFICIAL: Long-running metal goliaths DRAGONFORCE will kick off a near-month-long North American tour this Friday with support provided by Once Human. Slated to commence July 7th in San Francisco, California and run through July 29th in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, the tour includes a stop at Chicago Open Air in Chicago, Illinois which features Ozzy Osbourne, Slayer, Amon Amarth, Megadeth, and Clutch, among many others, as well as Rise Above Festival in Bangor, Maine with Korn, Stone Sour, Seether, Crobot, and more. See all confirmed dates below.

DRAGONFORCE will be touring in support their Reaching Into Infinity full-length recently released in the US via Metal Blade Records. The chart-topping offering earned the #5 spot on the Billboard Hard Music Albums chart, #12 on the Billboard Independent Albums chart, #16 on the Billboard Rock Albums chart, #48 on the Billboard Digital Albums chart, #58 on the Billboard Top 200 Current Albums chart, and #70 Billboard Top 200 chart!

For their seventh studio album, DRAGONFORCE has opened up their sound like never before, capturing the fierce, forlorn, and fun with both menace and melody. "I think we have proven that playing fast was something we were good at, so this time I wanted to bring even more diversity into our music," comments bassist Frederic Leclercq. "It's great to challenge ourselves instead of staying in a comfort zone, and I really wanted to experiment with [lead vocalist] Marc [Hudson]'s vocals. I think people are going to be surprised at his brutality!" The first album to feature Gee Anzalone, the Italian drummer has laid down an impressive performance to provide the perfect backbone to the DRAGONFORCE sound, which of course still boasts the band's trademark insanely-fast solos, courtesy of guitarists Herman Li and Sam Totman. Recording the bulk of the album at Fascination Street Studios in Sweden with producer Jens Bogren, the band also laid down tracks while touring their Killer Elite best of-album, utilizing Lamerluser Studios, (London, UK), Dark Lane Studios (Witney, UK), as well as the band's own Evil1 Studios in Charleville-Mezieres, France and Shredforce One Studios (California, US).